Porcupines, Chocobos, and the Effects of Mako
by UltimateSpirit
Summary: Zack and Cloud, best friends, wreaking havoc on the world, Sephiroth, and some poor innocent girls at a bar. short chapters about the two guys' lives during their free time from hunting monsters    R&R!
1. Cans and Windows

**A/N: So for all of the people who don't know this story line (I know at least one person who needs this, but if you don't, skip to the next paragraph). So Zack is a First Class soldier and Cloud is a Third Class, but they are only like four years apart in age. The army name is SOLDIER (in CAPS). It is a different universe and they fight monsters (kinda like monster control) and are at war with another country/group called Wutai (pronounced wooootayee lol) Mako is a substance that is equivalent to superman in a tube minus the flying. it gives you super hearing, speed, sight, strength, and the ability to heal super fast. Zack is young for a First, but he's just that good :o He is tall and has the build of a soldier, with long untamable black hair, much like a porcupine ;) Cloud is his best friend who has even pointier, crazier, hair that is like one giant cowlick, and he is built like Zack. Both are very attractive, use your imagination. (Sorry, any male figures reading, that's why I didn't go into deep detail. Just be aware that they are indeed very good looking guys. ^^ )**

**SO! This is going to be a series of one shots that are connected, so idk if that then makes it a story… ANYWAYS. So it is Zack and Cloud goofing off, getting into trouble, and breaking things, intentionally or not. So ya! This first chapter is just an intro to how my writing is (hopefully it will improve as I go) and how this story will be. Also, since both main characters are male, there will be a multitude of dick jokes, just to warn you. "That's what she said"s, awkward looks, that kinda thing. (But NO Zack/Cloud intimacy AT ALL. THIS IS NOT A SLASH FIC!)**

"Toss me a Coke?" Zack looked over towards the kitchen, only to find three prongs of chocobo hair sticking up from behind the old fridge door.

Cloud and Zack were sacking out in Zack's apartment after a long weekend of killing hormonal Senaws. Apparently it is a bad idea to try to "take care of" a factory's giant-lemur-with-spiky-tail problem during their mating season.

"Yeah, man," and he tossed it.

The can punched through the window opposite of Zack and left a spider web pattern of shattered glass.

"DUDE?"

"I'm sorry!" The scared Third backed away from the ancient fridge slowly, hands up defensively. "Thecanwassweaty… anduhh… thenewmako…"

"How could your hands be sweaty? You were in front of the fridge, failing to choose between mushu pork and my attempted lasagna. Both of which are at least four days old, so I imagine they taste about the same." Zack cringed at the memory of the lasagna that tasted of seafood. Odd, since it was vegetarian… He shrugged back into his spot on the couch comfortably, showing his friend he wasn't pissed. Well, not enough to show it.

Cloud sighed and muttered under his breath so even Zack's mako-enhanced ears couldn't hear, "The _can_ was sweating, not me, I do _not_ sweat like an animal." Holding his dish he walked to the giant beanbag chair that sat waiting next to the couch.

"Oh yes you do..." Zack muttered back. Damn it. He heard Cloud.

At the sounds of food-induced pleasure, Zack asked out of boredom, "So what'dya pick?" Cloud tilted his blue-green pottery bowl so Zack could observe the yellowish-red-brown slop slip to the side of his bowl, threatening to spill all over Cloud's pants.

"Both!"

Zack expressed his disgust with a variety of very creative facial expressions.

"What's it taste like?"

**That's it for now! Very short and not much comedy but I just wanted to get a start with their friendship and each character's personality in my story. So ya! Comment please? 5 Comments would be really good inspiration for me to write more ;)**


	2. Toothpaste and Balls

**A/N: Tada! FINALLY. Sorry for the wait… :/ anywhoo, here is a bit longer of a chapter. I brought in Tifa and Sephiroth, two new people, plus another character who is not from the game but a figment of my mind. So yeah. I'll explain more in the nxt authors note and chapter cuz its late, I'm tired, and in a rush to get this posted. So yeah! BTW: you all can thank my bffl for editing this and making it much better than it originally was. Thx hun! ^^ ok, ONWARD!**

(The next morning)

Cloud woke up in a daze after accidentally falling asleep on Zack's couch. Realizing his mouth tasted of week-old mushu-lasagna-ness, he went to brush his teeth.

While brushing, he tried to get his unmanageable hair to calm down without success, as was to be expected. He stalked out of the bathroom pissed at his hair, still brushing his teeth. He started to hum while walking over to the window, which was still broken. He stopped dead in his tracks, almost choking on his toothpaste, when he recognized a man, on the groud outside the apartment building, standing with the general. "Zack! I found the large bald man! Zack! _Zack!_"

Running into Zack's bedroom screaming, while spewing foam out of his mouth like he was infected with rabies, he tried to wake his friend. Zack, on high alert right after a mission, sprung out of bed and tackled Cloud to the floor. "Sorry, man."

"Tis okay, anyways, I broke your window." The chocobo shrugged smiling and walked back to the smashed window, where the aforementioned "large bald man" was standing three stories below in the grassy commons, talking to Sephiroth. "Dude, come see this guy." Cloud wiped his foamy mouth on his shirt while Zack slowly slunk over.

"See! It's the _large bald man!"_

Zack looked puzzled, one eyebrow raised and his lips pursed to the side.

"How can you _see_ that from here?" He thought for another second… "Why were you looking?" He understandably questioned his friend's motives for hunting down a… um… large balled man?

"What are you talking about? It's so obvious, it's the first thing my eyes went to." Zack watched in confusion, one blue eye twitching apprehensively as his friend looked out the window at the stranger. Why was Zack the only one to notice the awkwardness of the silence? Cloud continued, "I wish I was like him. Mine is just so untamable and never does what I want it to. One minute it's up, next, it's down."

Zack didn't want Cloud thinking he was being judgmental or anything, but come on. He needed some answers here. "So, uh, when did you realize you liked, uh," he scratched his head and looked to his feet, "large-balled men?"

"Well, the reason I brought it up was, isn't that the Wutainese soldier who switched to our side like a week ago and gave us all that info? No one has seen him since and I've been looking to spot him first, I kind of made a bet with Tifa at the bar on Friday, and I found him!" Cloud seemed proud of himself and his small victory of finding someone who was standing in broad daylight.

"Oh yeah." He remembered the Wutainese man converting, but he wasn't positive of why his friend was looking at his… "So… um you recognized him by his ball size?" He wondered how that was even possible.

"What?" Cloud turned slowly to his friend, hoping he heard him wrong." I recognized _what?_" Realization set in and Cloud jumped back from Zack a good three feet. "Hey now! I was _not_ staring at some guys junk! Large _bald _ man! As in NO HAIR!" Cloud began flailing, pointing to his head and making wild expressions, "my HAIR is untamable, not my… stuff! Gaia, Zack! I am _straight!_ I enjoy the company of woman quite often, than you!" Zack snorted and started to crack up and made a slow descent to the floor, clutching his stomach, his abs cramping from laughing.

"Ok, man, ok. I'm sorry." He continued to laugh. Cloud was all worked up and was pacing, still talking and using animated hand motions.

Sephiroth got distracted from his conversation when he saw his most mischievous (yet oddly most skilled) Third and First flailing and rolling on the floor up in a third-story window. He couldn't hear anything, but the sight was enough. He stopped mid-sentence and the large bald man turned to observe the same scene. Sephiroth looked back to the ex-wutain, "Those two are Zack and Cloud. Our youngest First and one of our best Thirds." The man looked impressed. "You'll be working with them soon." Then a nervous, slightly scared expression crossed the man's face.

**A/N: haha oooh awkward moments. Gotta love 'em. Hope you liked it, remember to leave a comment, bad or good! Thx! More comeing soon!**


	3. Tigers and Conditioner

**A/N: Soooo sorry this took so long, but it's much much longer than the other ones! so yeah! ^^ I hope you guys like it! and thx again to my friend for helping, she did a bunch on this one. Were many embarrassing typos… 0.0 enjoy! dnt forget to revieww! ^^**

"Ok. I'm done." Zack stumbled to stand up and chuckled once more. Cloud shot him a doubtful look. "No. Really." Zack's red face slowly returned to its natural tan tone.

"I can't believe you thought…"

"Dude, chill. Look. We'll go to Seventh Heaven, we'll chug some drinks, on me, 'til we get so wasted we hit on everything in the bar in heels. Unless it's a man. But let's hope we don't run into that, shall we?" he smiled, getting excited for the night to come.

"Okay." Cloud tried not to look too excited to go see Tifa. And everyone else. Not just her. Other people too. Yeah. Mhm.

Zack snapped his fingers in front of Cloud's face. "Hey! We've got to get you to training or Genesis is going to make you do suicides for two hours." They changed fast and grabbed their boots on the way out the door.

Cloud couldn't get his left boot on while hopping to the stairwell, and fell down the first flight of stairs. "Victory!" He held up his booted foot proudly.

"Let's go! I am _not_ doing suicides for you, _or_ listening to Genesis recite quotes about tardiness!" Zack yelled, already on the bottom floor, one foot out the door.

**. . .**

They ran out onto the training field, heading straight to Genesis to ask what he wanted them to do. Everyone was already paired up, practicing different sparring techniques. Zack didn't really have to be there, of course, seeing as how he was a First and all, but he hung around to help out Cloud a lot of the time. And a certain man was also standing next to Genesis…

"What're you staring at?" The bald man wondered, uncomfortable from the blatant look of bewilderment.

"I'm not gay!" Cloud burst out, almost yelling at the poor man. Genesis looked at the man to his left.

"Please excuse the mentally ill one. He's Cloud Strife. And this," he motioned to the porcupine, "is Zack Fair. Soldiers," he addressed them formally, hinting at them to shape up their behavior, "This is Kiel. He had been, and will continue to observe this class that you, Strife, were all too casually late to." Genesis was playing up his role as leader and thoroughly enjoying it. "Now go spar. Practice rotation 6. Cloud, work on blocking your left side, and Zack, no sword."

"Awww! But Gen!"

"_Go!_"

**. . .**

Cloud's left foot caved in Zack's stomach, dead center, between his ribs. Zack took the blow, recovering quickly, and grabbed Blondie's foot, flipping him over. This worked until Cloud used the momentum to push of the ground with his hands and use his foot to perform an uppercut motion to the bottom of Zack's jaw. The puppy wined from biting his tongue, but growled and got into a crouch. Having seen this move many times in battle, Cloud timed a jump to his right just in time to miss the left footed back sided round house kick. But, the left side of Cloud's caught the effect of one of the two chest jabs that followed the kick. His balance was diminished to nothing and he stumbled into a sitting position on the ground. Zack walked over and went down to pin him. He didn't expect Cloud's right leg to swing to his right shoulder and pull him down with a swift leg jerk. They rolled around trying to gain power over the other. After straddling Zack's back and jamming his elbow into the back of the black-mop-covered neck, Kiel walked by and spotted them.

"You know, you're not helping the whole 'I'm not gay' thing," he smirked and kept walking.

Zack took advantage of the split second Cloud was distracted. He flipped Cloud over to sit on his diaphragm so it was difficult to breathe and impossible to get up. "Victory is mine!"

Cloud relaxed completely, giving up, and shoved his face into the grass. He said some not nice things.

**. . .**

"Good work today, soldiers! Nice improvement. Go have some fun tonight and have a good weekend. Dismissed!" After Genesis released them, the "gay couple" ran back to Zack's apartment to take showers and head to Seventh Heaven. This was the plan for most SOLDIERs on Friday nights.

. . .

"Damn drunk Angeal… shattering my last black liquor bottle…" Tifa muttered as she mopped the floor behind the bar.

Cloud and Zack, weaving through the many full tables, glanced around for their petite ninja friend. Cloud spotted her spring up behind the bar, holding a bucket and some broken glass chunks. Zack saw Cloud's face and knew he'd found her.

"Hey Tif!" Zack yelled over the crowd and music.

"Hey guys." She smiled, giggling and rolling her eyes, when she saw Cloud. Gaia, he was so bad at hiding it. "What'll it be tonight, boys? I've got everything but black liquor." That earned her quizzical looks, "Angeal already came, drank, and left, but not before the bastard felt the need to take a swig. From the bottle. And then attempted. To. Juggle!" She was making an infantryman a "Sex on the Beach" as she ranted and put five extra shots of tequila in the fruity drink. She hated when soldiers ordered fruity girly drinks then tried to act manly while holding a drink with a freaking umbrella in it. "Here, you pansy." She gave the guy his drink. (She wasn't often rude, but she was ticked after Angeal.) It was the infantryman's fourth drink, and his mako-free body was swaying already. He shrugged and walked away, pumping his fist in the air.

"_Cheers!"_

"Okay." Tifa took a breath to relax, closing her eyes. She returned her attention to the two sitting in front of her. "So, you want an Opa-Opa," looking at Cloud, "and you want a Guinness."

"Six pack each, please! To start." Zack winked at the small dark-haired one playfully. Why didn't Cloud have the balls to flirt?

Tifa brought over the first round of drinks, "and your reason for attempting to get your mako-infused alcohol-resistant selves sloshed is…?"

Cloud hung his head and begged, "Tif, drinks. Please. No talk." Zack was laughing.

**. . .**

_(Six cases later…)_

**. . .**

Cloud got up from his bar stool wobbling, his feet threatening to send him splattering across the floor. "If you," *beer burp* "must know..." He was going to fall, so he grabbed the edge of the closest table and sat in the chair. He failed to notice the wasted infantryman already occupying the black furnished chair. "I was accused of being gay." He wore an exaggerated look of horror and waved his beer around in the air, his pinky poised. "Do I _look_ gay to _you?_"

Zack, mid-swallow, choked and spewed out a fizzy mess all over the bar's black wood counter. "Yes!" He couldn't control his drunken giggles. Cloud wrinkled his nose and stood, walking towards the music system behind the bar. "My friend, my dearest comrade, please bless us all with buoyant, gallant, fascinating, extravagant, relish music," Zack continued. Mind you this was all spoken with a pathetically attempted British accent.

"I think you mean lavish…" Tifa rolled her eyes.

"On with the pickle music!" Cloud rejoiced.

The beginning cheers of a recorded live audience seeped through the speakers. Everyone in the bar recognized the song and cheered loudly. Cloud took this as encouragement to jump onto the bar, get on his knees, and begin to strum the guitar chords on his air guitar. Surprisingly, he was right with the exact beat. Sixteen bars later, Zack climbed up, ripped one of the blue and gold levers off the beer tab, and began belting out the lyrics, horribly off-key.

"_Risin' up! Back on the streets…"_

The rest of the bar guests egged them on and formed a crowd. "_Just to keep them aliiiiiiiiiiive_…" Cloud was still mock-playing the guitar while he and Zack leaned back to back. They lost balance and fell on their butts. "In the eyeeeeeee!" Zack leaped to his feet and screeched out the top note, "Of the tiger." He finished the chorus in a dramatic crouch and whisper. Cloud's guitar solo was coming up and he began to lose synchronization with the music.

By the end of the song, Zack was hanging from the back of his knees from the rafters, still singing. Cloud had traded in his guitar to use the imaginary keyboard that he had set up really quickly. Cloud also partook in a few different styles of interpretive dance, falling off the "stage" twice. They had the whole crowd dancing and singing. Badly. Dancing and singing very badly.

"Thank you! Thank you!" Zack bowed and Cloud curtsied, and they hopped behind the counter. The crowd began to move away from the bar back to their tables, the excitement dwindling down.

"Well _that_, I can honestly say, is something I have never seen. And I've seen a lot." A girl about Tifa's age, nineteen or twenty, was leaning against the doorframe wearing a baggy gray Tee, skinny jeans and black lace-up combat boots paired with brown hair and ice-blue eyes. "Tif, I thought you were thinking of closing early...?" she yawned widely, attempting to cover it up.

"Oh hey," she turned to her friend. not noticing her presence at first. "Sorry to wake you, you could use all the rest you can get. If you…" Zack cut her off.

"Who are you?" He looked just like an excited little puppy, with big eyes and a goofy grin.

"I'm grumpy and tired, but also slightly amused. I'm Diana." She offered her hand. Zack attempted a shake but missed the first time. "Ahha, you've been enjoying the bar. Tif, I'm goin' back to bed. Nice to meet you two, um…"

"Zack and Cloud. Now go get some sleep." Tifa pushed her towards the stairs. Diana stretched on her way back up the stairs leading to Tifa's apartment above the bar.

"No way are you two riding home on your motorcycles… ugh. Zack, you chose last time. Cloud, couch or bean bag?"

"Bean baaaaggg!" He skipped up the stairs.

"But I hate the couch! Tifaaahh…"

. . .

Tifa was mopping the floor up, as there was splashed beer and stickiness everywhere. Then something-nope, someone- ran into the door.

A hand finally found the knob and let himself and two others in. The first one in was Sephiroth. "Tifa. I need your expertise. This is an urgent mission. Do you accept?" He was talking all business-y and had a serious face that was a bit overkill but…

"Um okay? Yes?"

"Help me!"

"We're _back_!" Hey, where's all the black liquor?" Angeal was puzzled. He was the only one who even liked the licorice-flavored brandy, where could it have gone?

"You! You smashed my liquor, the nasty stuff I only keep for you, and you smashed it! because of you I've been smelling licorice all damn night!" She was fuming, balancing on tiptoes to get right in Angeal's face, which looked very afraid.

"Looky what I did!" Genesis came skipping over, pointing to Sephiroth's head. "You like it? I think it's pretty." He smiled proudly and stuck out his chin like a three-year-old showing off his finger paints. Tifa saw the mess of knots and tangles spewing from the back of Sephiroth's head. It almost looked like the start to a single giant three-foot long dreadlock.

"Lovely." Sarcasm dripped as her thoughts reeled.

"Get it out, please, I don't wanna cut it!" Whining wasn't like Sephiroth, even when drunk, but this was his _hair_. Goddess knows how he was about his precious silver locks…

"You need conditioner." She got blank stuff looks from the three men. "You know… after shampoo in the shower…" Nothing but more blank stares. Apparently Angeal found something amusing because he slapped his hands over his mouth quite loudly and started to chuckle.

"Hey Sephy…" He elbowed his friend in the ribs, "I think she just asked you to take a shower with her…" He winked.

"_Ugh!_ Go find conditioner and a comb. It'll work wonders. Now _out!_" They walked out to go hunt for conditioner, loose on the streets of Midgar.

**A/N: So? what did you think? btw: Diana is a character from another user's story that kicks ass. so I asked for permission (and it was granted) to let her make a cameo. she may come in every now and then to be Zack's distraction, lol I'm not sure and it all depends of the author letting me. I'm try to keep her in character as much as possible. If you wanna read the story PM me and I'll tell you about it! So I hope you liked the bar rant, and yeah i noticed after that i got caught up in the song and didn't actually have them do bad flirting... maybe another time. I've got some plans ahead. OK! GO REVIEW!**


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